Clandestine detention center (Argentina)

ESMA, a well-known clandestine detention center.
Memorial at the former detention center of Quinta de Mendez [es]

The clandestine detention, torture and extermination centers, also called (in Spanish: centros clandestinos de detención, tortura y exterminio, CCDTyE —or CCDyE or CCD—, by their acronym), were secret facilities used by the Armed, Security and Police Forces of Argentina to torture, interrogate, rape, illegally detain and murder people. The first ones were installed in 1975, during the constitutional government of María Estela Martínez de Perón. Their number and use became generalized after the coup d'état of March 24, 1976, when the National Reorganization Process took power, to execute the systematic plan of enforced disappearance of people within the framework of State terrorism. With the fall of the dictatorship and the assumption of the democratic government of Raúl Alfonsín on December 10, 1983, the CCDs ceased to function, although there is evidence that some of them continued to operate during the first months of 1984.[1]

The Armed Forces classified the CCDs into two types:[2]

  • Definitive Place (in Spanish: Lugar Definitivo, LD): they had a more stable organization and were prepared to house, torture and murder large numbers of detainees.
  • Temporary Place (in Spanish: Lugar Transitorio, LT): they had a precarious infrastructure and were intended to function as a first place to house the detainees-disappeared.

The plan of the de facto government, which exercised power in Argentina between March 24, 1976, and December 10, 1983, the clandestine centers were part of the plan to eliminate political dissidence. Similar operations were carried out in other countries in the region, with the express support of the US government, interested in promoting at all costs the control of communism and other ideological currents opposed to its side in the Cold War. According to data from 2006, there were 488 places used for the kidnapping of victims of State terrorism, plus another 65 in the process of revision that could enlarge the list.[3][4] In 1976 there were as many as 610 CCDTyE, although many of them were temporary and circumstantial.

Argentina hosted over 520 clandestine detention centers during the course Dirty War.[5] There was no standard for the location, torture methods, or leadership of detention centers, but they all operated on the purpose of political opposition, punishing prisoners suspected to be involved in socialism or other forms of political dissent. Little information is known about the true nature of the centers during their operation, due to the mass murder of inmates to maintain secrecy.[6][7]

  1. ^ Dandan, Alejandra (June 8, 2011). "Cecilia Viñas hizo escuchar a la justicia la voz de su hija, que la llamó desde un centro clandestino. 'Ahora estamos otra vez lejos, mamá'". Página/12 (in Spanish).
  2. ^ CONADEP. "Nunca más. Informe de la CONADEP. Emplazamiento de los C.C.D." www.desaparecidos.org (in Spanish). Retrieved 2023-12-15.
  3. ^ "Unas 500 cárceles clandestinas, en el mapa de la represión de la dictadura". Clarín (in Spanish). August 6, 2006.
  4. ^ "Copia archivada" (in Spanish). Archived from the original on August 29, 2017. Retrieved August 29, 2017.
  5. ^ Centros clandestinos de la ciudad de Buenos Aires. Buenos Aires, Argentina: Instituto Espacio para la Memoria. 2007. OCLC 231632095.
  6. ^ Cite error: The named reference :2 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  7. ^ Cite error: The named reference :0 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).